“Shower shoes my ass,” I said aloud, my voice played against the walls, which I could see were tiled. Flip-flops weren’t going to cut it in this room.
I needed a gas can and a match.
As I was turning to leave, I heard a faint scraping. At first it seemed to be coming from the stalls, perhaps through an overlooked vent in the ceiling. How was I to know for sure—I was busy looking toward the door. Unlike so many victims in horror movies, I did not have to be told to run by the black man in the sixth row of the theater. I know what that threatening music means. I grabbed for the knob and pulled. It spun loose in my grasp, rotating in its cuff like a dial.
Broken.
I spun around and collapsed against the door, facing the shower room and the source of the odd noise, listening.
Nothing.
And then a whole lotta something.
An aching squelch that could only be nails scratching against metal flooded the room, followed by a thudding bump against the door. It jarred with such force I was scooted forward across the floor, sarong snagging on the concrete. I winced, not with pain but with the knowledge my skin was being horribly scraped. I rebounded and braced against a second assault.
“Who the fuck is it?” I screamed, forcing my heels into a couple of chips in the floor for leverage.
A low rolling growl responded and a tapping of nails scurried across the metal.
Then the door crept open, not from a ramming thud but a slow methodical pressure. I stiffened and fought to hold my ground. There was no question the werewolves had found us, but had they found the others first? Was there anyone out there to help me?
I felt the scream climbing my throat before I even thought to do it. It echoed in the cinderblock building.
The crack in the door widened and claws as black and sharp as those I’d imagined were reached for me in reality. Splintered jagged nails curving out of hairy fingers crooked around the door, where they curled the paint off with each scratch. I forced my body against it, catching the werewolf’s—oh … what would you call that?—paw between the frame and the metal corner.
Outside a long yelping reply turned from ear-shattering to distant within a few seconds.
I flung the door open and ran like a retard in orthopedic shoes,63 arms windmilling and feet stumbling over even the smallest pebbles, twigs and/or Idahoan rodent in my path. I’d reached the campfire before I noticed that both the heels were missing from my Manolos … or were they Louboutins? Jesus! You know I’m freaked out when I can’t categorize fashion.
“What’s up with you?” Gil asked, sipping from a red plastic party cup.
“Didn’t any of you hear me?” I looked from one face to the next. Pina Colada, or whatever, had returned from her stroll with the Jojobas in tow;64 they flanked her on a fireside bench like zealous bookends, but wait … these were zealous bookends with name tags—as if the short-sleeve dress shirts weren’t geeky enough.
Tad and Corey.
Moving on …
Honey and Gil were a bit too cozy for Mr. Kim’s taste. He stood on the hood of the car with his arms crossed and an uncommonly murderous glare. Wendy was licking at the inside rim of her flask.
“Wow. You guys are super helpful. I barely escaped an horrific death, and here you are chatting and …”— I paused to point out the presumed missionaries— “… flirting.”
“Am not!” Granita yelled and stalked off into the night, Jehovah and Witness—respectively—trailing in her wake. As she rounded the corner of the RV, the two Cleaver kids came into view, for a second—and only a second—I could have sworn they were holding hands. Maybe I’d misjudged their relationship.
Maybe.
“Good evening, folks,” the boy said. His blonde hair was Swedish straight and tossed around his head like a beaded skirt. The girl stood half behind him, a mirror in female form. If these weren’t a couple of Flowers in the Attic, I’d eat my shoes. “I’m Billy and this is my sister, Clare.”
“Hi, everyone,” she said.
His words were so measured, so deliberately polite and polished; I couldn’t help but mock. “Hi, Billy. Hi, Clare. It’s super great to meet you both.”
“Jesus. Could you be a bigger bitch?” Wendy asked, tossing the shiny Chococat flask to the ground and stomping away.65 The kids might actually be useful. If they hadn’t just come from a taboo gropefest, they might have seen or at least heard my scrap with the werewolf.
“She’s right. I’m such a dick. Why don’t you plant your asses?” I motioned toward the log Wendy left. The twins (I was fairly certain) both cringed—possibly due to my course language,66 but followed the direction; Billy, producing an actual handkerchief, unfolded and shook it out across the bark. Clare sat down on it, mouthing a thank you to Billy.
I shuddered at their intimacy and looked around the group for some back up. Gil’s eyes were wide with horror and remarkably so were Honey’s. That girl was growing on me. I had to shake off the grossness and get down to business.
“Did either of you hear that howling, a while back?” I asked.
“Wild dogs, I thought,” Billy said. “But we were down by the barn, so I can’t be certain.”
Honey and Gil snickered.
I refrained and pounced. “So you did hear!” I pointed at the kid daring Gil not to acquiesce to the possibility. “See? I was totally being attacked and even these two— who were twice as far away, mind you—heard it. You can be so fucking self-absorbed.”
“Granted.” He took another sip, and said nothing more. Instead, his eyes darted from the twins back to me and then to the back window of the RV. The tin foil screen was peeled back á là Jiffy Pop, framing Fishhook as he waved his arms back and forth; his eyes bugging out like a Looney Toons character.
He got it. “Well, it’s been real nice meeting you two. I’m sure your parents are worried, it being dark and all.” I stood, extending my hand in the direction of the path between the vehicles.
“Well, it was nice meeting you as well, Miss?” Billy rose and helped his sister up.
“Amanda is fine. That’s Gil and Honey.”
“It was nice meeting all of you. Maybe we could talk more tomorrow, but if not, enjoy your trip and …” He curled his fingers into claws and growled. “Don’t let the dogs get you.”
“Yeah, okay.” I followed them to the road and watched them make their way back to their trailer. I supposed I was just being sensitive, what with the guy showing up at the motel, and the more recent gunplay with Honey. Was everyone following us? It was enough to make a girl paranoid.
Inside the camper, Fishhook had calmed down considerably. He slouched into the passenger seat, the Tupperware container open on his lap. And empty. Whatever he was protecting—drugs I’d suspected— had long since been consumed. His eyes rolled up into his skull and a shallow sigh took the place of the urgent comment I expected.
“They’re comin’, girl,” he whispered and then his head lolled against his shoulder, out. I didn’t need to check his pulse to know the man had life in him; I could smell his body functioning, the various tracts filling, emptying. The bile, the food digesting in stomach acid. The blood gravy sloshing through the pipes.
I shook off the urge to devour, remembering the hooks that laced his intestines like landmines. Once you got started, it was nearly impossible to stop at one bite, and I couldn’t risk another reaper bill. As it was, the abrasions from the concrete were going to cost a couple of thousand to clear up.
I left him there and joined Honey, Gil and Wendy, who’d returned from her huff.
“He’s passed out now, drugs I think.”
“He sure was animated a minute ago. Freaked out, even.” Gil tossed the cup into the fire. It popped and curled in on itself until it was a black ball. The dense smoke it produced filled the air with that harsh chemical smell that always seems to signal the end of a fireside chat.
“What were you drinking anyway?”
Gil shrugged.
We
ndy, still clearly aggravated, said, “He got some blood off of your buddy in there.”
“Gil!”
“It’s not like I didn’t ask first. He just popped off a scab and let it drain.”
“That is so gross!”
“Yeah, right,” he said. “That’s gross. Drinking blood from a cup is gross.”
I raised my palms in defeat. Better than hear him recount the litany of filth that hung out in human bowels and bladders and such. “Did we figure out how we’re going to give Honey a final viewing of her dearly departed?”
Honey’s voice wavered. “Madame Gloria helped us out. We’re going to see the Kraken of Butte.”
“Montana, then?” Wendy had her I’m sorry face on so I didn’t sneer or anything.
“One problem,” she said. “The Kraken won’t tell us any secrets without an offering.”
“Like money?”
“Like a heart,” Honey said, downtrodden.
“I don’t think that’ll be a problem.”
Wendy nodded her agreement.
60 Not at all like the butchery of consonants and vowels that is Amanda Shutter.
61 She said, “pulling my dick.” Couldn’t help it.
62 Would someone tell me why I’m explaining myself? Fuck off.
63 That’s right, a retard. You want to make somethin’ of it?
64 If only we could be so lucky to get a skin care fix out here in bumfuck.
65 I won’t fault her for it. There’s nothing worse than hitting the bottom of the bottle, or is that “rock bottom”? Whatever.
66 But, really, do I seem like I’d be bothered worrying about the fragile sensibilities of the incestuous? C’mon.
Chapter 10
You Gotta Have Heart
The human population, at large, has come close to discovering our presence on a number of occasions, primarily as a result of various unchecked werewolf packs and the zombie outbreaks of 2007. The reapers counteract these events in metropolitan areas, but what if something happens in a rural community? Is it time to deputize?
—Undead Science Monitor (Fall Yearbook)
There’s nothing quite like a scream to break up the pristine silence of dawn. It puts everyone on edge and really sets the tone for a busy day in advertising. That’s why I have it set as my alarm at home—not that I sleep or anything as mundane as that.67 But I hadn’t brought my alarm clock, so this particular scream was a little disconcerting, plus it interrupted my reading and I hate that.
I glanced across the table to Wendy. “Could you?”
“Could I what?” Her tone dropped immediately into lazy suspicion.
“What do you mean what? Go check on that scream.”
“Bitch, please.” She rolled her eyes. “I need to know how this turns out.” She snapped an OK magazine cover in front of my face. “Hello? Brad’s leaving Angelina because she only eats toast. That’s important news, no matter how you slice it.”
“Are you serious?”
“Um. If that weren’t enough, Hannah Montana has VD.”
I clicked my tongue. “You made that up.”
“You investigate,” she whined. “You enjoy that kind of shit.”
“Fine.” I slapped my novel down on the table, loud enough to wake a dozing Fishhook. He swung his arm down from the bunk over the driver’s seat, waved me off. His heavy-lidded eyes and groaning had me worried I’d actually bitten him on accident. Then I remembered his drug binge.
With a sneer, I slipped my feet into the surprisingly comfortable penny loafers, rolled up the pants until I’d achieved a sly Audrey Hepburn homage, or at the very least a Jet girl from West Side Story.
The door slammed after me, slapping into place with an echo. I stepped off the slab of concrete into the piles of dead leaves that carpeted the majority of the grounds and slipped between the Volvo and the camper to get out to the car path. On my way, I glanced inside the backseat and saw Honey crashed out asleep and Mr. Kim watching over her from behind the seat, a subtle smile played on his nearly visible lips. He didn’t notice me.
I didn’t notice anything weird, at first. There wasn’t any immediate activity to warrant a scream of that nature, no herds of zombie mistakes shambling around, no sasquatches out hunting for the morning newspaper, and certainly no snarling werewolves. Now, that would be screamworthy.
The Cleavers must have been getting ready to go when it happened. Their campsite was cleaner than when they came and the father, a broad-shouldered man with a hair part as crisp as his pressed dress shirt and khakis was already ambling down the road, a look of concern slapped on his face.68
“Did you hear that?” he asked in a tone both friendly and authoritarian; his face crinkled up in such a sincere way I was mesmerized. “A mighty loud scream. Mighty loud.”
“Yes, sir.” The words just flew out of my mouth, like I was actually used to being polite.
He continued past me toward the cultist’s tent. I followed.
“Are your wife and daughter alright?” I struggled to keep up.
“They’re safe and sound in our rolling abode.” He turned and gave a weak wave in that direction. “Everyone accounted for in your rig?”
I had to think. Wendy and Fishhook were in there. Gil had just tucked in for the dawn and Mr. Kim and his sister were safe in the car. That left … Granita. Had she not come back last night? She didn’t seem to be the type to tag team the choirboys.69 I could be wrong.
My fear was that the werewolves had really found us. I’d nearly forgotten about them, preferring to blame last night’s horror on the kid’s “wild dog” theory.
“Yeah. I think one of the girls is missing.” Why couldn’t I remember her name? “You must have seen her. Très très white?”
“Ah yes. I hope she’s down there with those boys.” He pointed down the road. One stood facing the entrance to their tent, the other squatted beside him cradling his own head and rocking.
As we approached, nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. The tent was an average two-man number in an impractical shade of yellow with gray stripes, but other than that, nothing apparent to warrant the guy’s breakdown. He sobbed and mumbled, blowing saliva bubbles like a toddler.
“It’s a mess,” Tad or Corey said, it was hard to distinguish them without their name tags.
Standing directly in front of the open flaps, the scene opened up like an autopsy. The left portion of the tent’s internal divide was splattered with gore. A jagged hole intruded into its side, dripping blood from swaying nylon scraps. Entrails formed a breadcrumb trail to Granita’s body—or at least her torso— heaped and broken under the empty lower branches of a dying evergreen. The misshapen squares of pale flesh that weren’t clumped with wads of bloody pine needles had grown blue and mottled in death.70 Ants marched across the pile of meat en masse nestling in the empty socket of Becky’s neck, like the final guests to some gruesome picnic.
No sign of her head or extremities.71
Ward gave no indication if he was horrified at the discovery. Of course, I wasn’t particularly grossed out, but you’d think I’d be the only one.
“Yep. That’s a dead girl. Poor thing,” he said and then with a quick smile, turned and strode back up the gravel road and out of sight. My mouth was still open in shock at his hasty departure, when the bus revved up and came barreling toward the exit, forcing the two freaked-out cultists to dive out of the way and toward the tent. Corey or Tad, one, fell across the top, collapsing the structure with a sloshing wet thud, that shot blood out the opening like a smashed ketchup packet. This caused the other missionary to weep all the more dramatically, dropping to his knees and pounding his chest.72
The Cleavers slowed to a stop a few feet away and the passenger window opened revealing the happy home-maker for the first time.
“Oops!” she yelled out to the splayed boy. “Sorry about that.” Then disregarded the prone traumatized figure to address me. “And you must be Amanda. I must thank you for being hospitabl
e toward my William and Clare. I am truly sorry we didn’t get a chance to meet, before this terrible circumstance.” Her blond hair was scrolled away from her pert face in a French twist, revealing a thin upturned nose and ruby lips not seen since the ′50s. “You will understand if we get on with our trip. We do so hate to be waylaid. I’m sure you’d agree.”
“Naturally,” I said. Though, frankly, I was just happy to see the weirdos go.
“Ciao!” she yelled and pageant waved, one photo away from an antique soapbox.
As they made the corner, Mr. Cleaver gunned it sending a spray of gravel spraying across the lawn like a tacky Vegas fountain show. Billy and Clare were staring placidly from the rear window.
“Are you alright?” I took the boy’s hand and pulled him out of the ruins of canvas and bent poles.
“Just a little disturbed.” He kneaded his left shoulder.
“Well yeah. So … what happened?”
“I don’t really know. We were up late talking. Tad and I had nearly convinced Becky to let us take her up to the compound, but it got late and she said she’d be more comfortable sleeping down here.”
I cocked my head, wondering if the “compound” was some sort of cultist code for a little train party. I prepared for the naughty bits. Unfortunately, none were forthcoming. Fucking goody-two-shoes.
“We zipped the center wall in place and gave her one of the sleeping bags, while we shared the other.”
“Oh yes?” I winked at him. “Okay. Alright. I gotcha.” I certainly knew my share of euphemisms.
He flinched. Clearly, the implication of gayness passed well over his head. “The next thing we knew, Becky was screaming. By the time we got out of the tent this is what we found. Whatever did it was awfully fast … and quiet.”
Or whoever, I thought, looking over the property. The forested areas surrounding the field were certainly dense enough to secret away an entire pack of werewolves. Markham’s goons wouldn’t have any problem surveying the scene from just about anywhere.
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